Hachiya Persimmon
2001: Dropped most of its fruit, then started a second crop because the weather confused it. Wind and over watering caused most of the fruit to drop. We only picked 3 fruits, and the taste was barely satisfactory. Used metallic streamers to keep the birds away.

2002: The branches are spindly, so we use stakes to support them when the fruit comes on. Apparently doesn't need much water. As of early July we have had a few fruits fall, apparently due to the wind. By Sept. 22 we still have a fair number of fruits left on the tree (including a few that are too young to make it). I expect to pick our first fruits in about two weeks. First fruit picked in late October. More in early November. Flavor is good this year, perhaps due to the fish and shrimp fertilizer? Expect 18-19 fruits this year. Got 19. Quality was moderate. Perhaps the tree needs to mature, or we need to use more fertilizer.

2003: The support stake was in contact with several branches, and has apparently caused the smaller of these branches to wither, and the larger ones to be stunted. Didn't realize how sensitive persimmon trees are. 8/21/03 Most of the fruit has fallen, so this year's crop will be very small. It looks like we should never water this more often than once every two weeks. Or perhaps not at all after the fruit is larger than a ping-pong ball. Later: we got about 22 fruits, total.

2004: 3/10/04: The new leaves are just coming out. The trunk has thickened ever so slightly since the tree was planted, so perhaps we'll develop a fine specimen out of this one yet. 6/5/04: The crop may be very heavy this year, but yesterday we saw a few small fruits (acorn-sized) fall. I'll cut way back on the watering now. 7/11/04: In spite of reduced watering we still see unripe fruit falling. I'm not sure what our crop will be like this year. 9/5/04: The wind in this area is not ideal for persimmons. It still looks like we'll get a crop slightly larger than last year. Some fruits are starting to get a slight tinge of orange color to them. The trunk has gotten decidedly larger this year, which was formerly a concern of mine.

2005: 2/27/05: The new leaves are just now coming (about 2 weeks earlier than last year). 4/21/05: We can see the small fruits now. We tried to straighten the tree with some ropes, so we'll see how effective that is. 9/6/05: The fruits are approaching softball- size. I've observed much windfall over the last week or so. 10/6/05: We have some 50-60 fruits on the tree, many of which are nearly ripe. However, the fruits are smaller than usual. 10/22/05: I counted 152 fruits still on the tree yesterday. We picked one earlier that ripened on the tree, but the taste was not good.

DSCN0625.JPG 2006: 2/26/06: I can see the buds coming alive. But there are yet no new leaves. 4/13/06: New leaves have been out for two weeks or more now. 5/19/06: It looks like we'll be lucky to have even 50% of the crop that we had last year, and probably much less than that. The tree is healthy, but there just weren't many blossoms. 6/21/06: Branch growth has been good this year, so we're setting up for a great crop in 2007. 7/4/06: The fruit is self-thinning these days. I hope we get a few score persimmons out of this year, but we will get nothing near the 152 that we had last year. 7/19/06: The fruit continues to self-thin. Persimmons are smaller than a walnut, but bigger than a cherry. 8/13/06: Fruit continues to drop, but new growth appeared about 2 weeks ago, and the usual second crop of fruit is coming along, but it will as usual not ripen in time. 9/8/06: Fruit continues to drop. I expect only the smallest of crops this year. 9/22/06: Fruit is becoming orange, but again appears to be small. I guess we'll have fewer than 50 fruits this year. 12/12/06: Harvest began on 10/30/06 and continued through 12/12/06, for total of 106 fruits.

2007: 5/13/07: The tree has grown a good deal, and it has lots of small blossoms/early fruit. 6/9/09: The fruit is self-thinning to the tune of hundreds of nearly-dime-sized fruits falling. 7/6/07: Self- thinning has gone to an extreme this year. 12/1/07: Began picking persimmons on 10/28/07. Peak harvest was between 11/14/07 and 11/22/07. Last fruits were picked on 12/1/07. Total of 364 fruits (comparied to 106 last year). Most fruits were on the small side, but we had a fair number that were medium to large.

2008: 3/13/08: The new leaves appeared a week ago, so now the entire tree is green-tipped. 4/13/08: When we trimmed the tree several weeks ago we left a number of "dead-looking" branches just in case they weren't dead. Today I noticed that several of the "dead" branches have new leaves coming on. Just goes to show you that persimmons shouldn't be pruned unless it's very clear that the branches are dead. 6/7/08: The quantity of young fruit is far below that of last year. We've seen mild fruit drop so far. The tree looks generally to be in good health. 7/5/08: Fruit drop is still minimal. Fruits are now a bit larger than hazelnuts with the shell on.

2009: 3/26/09: New leaves came on just about 2 weeks ago. Yesterday I fed this tree (and all my other trees) fertilizer spikes, along with some old rusty wire to give it some extra iron. Someone told me to bury a hunk of rusty metal so that this tree would have a permanent source of iron, but all I could find was the rusty wire. 6/11/09: So far we have had no fruit drop. New growth has been abundant, and the leaves are huge. We attribute the leaf size to the horse manure that we put around the tree some months ago. Persimmons seem to really love manure. 11/29/09: We picked the last persimmons two days ago. Most of the fruits were quite large this year.